... this is different. Seen plenty of film of single launches from a submerged Ballistic Missile Submarine. This is the first I've seen of a combat launch when the 'boat' would need to get all the rockets off to target as quickly as possible. A potential launch of 24 missiles from an Ohio class submarine would be a really awesome sight. And a very large bummer when they started coming down.

... my propaganda is spreading and soon I will take over the world! Bwahahahahah! oops- sorry about that. 'Dark Roasted Blend' has picked-up many images from my Flickr blog 'X-Ray Delta One' for use in an entry about Cold War heavy bombers!

... contrary to the advertisement; B-50 Boeing bombers were never used in the Korean War. The almost completely new and re-designed version of the WW2 B-29 Superfortress was too valuable to the recently formed Strategic Air Command's nuclear deterrent force. Regular B-29 Superfortresses, still in service, were used in Korea.

... MK-39 hydrogen bomb. Four megaton yield. 700 produced. A distinctly non-glamorous design. Capable of being fitted inside the early guided missiles of the time. Also used as the payload in the B-58 'Hustler' weapons pod. The big- bruiser did not seem to suffer from an inferiority complex despite it's distinctly non-aerodynamic shape. Liked to go bowling on Saturday nights and drink lots of beer. Frequented strip clubs near the armories on the seedier part of town.

When used as a 'free-fall' weapon, released from a strategic bombers bombay, a slightly rounded nose and stubby fins were attached. The slightly rounded nose on these devices was filled with a honeycomb material. A parachute was deployed from a package on the rear of the weapon. In the 'lay-down' setting the bomb would would land on the ground at a stately pace, crushing the shock absorbing nose. There was a time delay fuze option.

... makes your imagination work overtime- seeing one of these things crunch into some Moscow backyard. A little old lady in a ba-bushka beating it with a rake because it ruined her plot of prize turnips.... '3,2,1,0.'

... caught up in cold War fever of technology, the use of Atomic Explosives was proposed for many civil engineering projects. Including this 1946 article from 'Popular Mechanix". Why use plain old TNT to build a canal, or level a mountain top, when you can do it cheaper and much faster with an atomic bomb! It sort of made sense. Nuclear explosives were millions of times more powerful than old-fashioned chemical explosives.

'Operation Plowshare' was the Atomic Energy Commissions attempt to find 'peaceful' uses for nuclear weapons technology. Between 1961 and 1973, twenty-seven nuclear detonations were conducted to test the feasibility of everything from creating harbors to extracting natural gas from rock. Some ideas seemed to work, others didn't. One problem persisted. Everything was wildly radioactive. There were dim promises of special designs for extremely 'clean' atomic explosives whose residual radioactivity would have been lessened. These 'kinder-gentler' bombs never came to be and the project fizzled out under the weight of it's own absurdity.

Here is Edward Teller, one of the most notorious 'Strangelovian' characters, explaining it all to us in a recently de-classified film.

... before modern, long-range radar, aircraft
with large radomes flew constant patrols
watching for Soviet bombers. This augmented what ground based radar there was. It was not until the early 1960's and the completion of the DEW Line that North American radar coverage was 'complete'.